Restored Panasonic AG-1980 - worth the price?

[Quasipal]

I use the Panasonic FS200 for my video editing work (I make short films as part of my hobby). Honestly, without a powerful computer video editing in the digital domain is painful and slow. I have tried, I have sat there waiting 20 minutes for one simple fade to 'render' and still not being happy as I could not add music or narrative or anything really. I gave up trying to make a DVD from a (waste of money) Panasonic HD camcorder - it used some completely different format that was called AVHD I think - even the manual warned it may take a whole day of computer crunching to make one lousy DVD. Of course no audio dub either...

I wish VHS was better quality but its either that or sit there while my computer works overtime and gets hot.

[Brad]

I don't get it. How does your post relate to the topic?

[SixFiftyThree]

I'm investigating the DETAIL-NOR-EDIT switch. Not clear on any significant differences between "DETAIL" and "NOR", but EDIT suggests that it could indeed be some form of disabling the D/NR.

But it's overly grainy/noisy, and has artifacts.

Yes it should disable the DNR. But what kind of artifacts? Otherwise, grainy/noisy is as expected with EDIT. Oversharpened too. That's what it does - it boosts HF noise as compensation for the losses expected in analog dubbing. It's not the 'true' image (as is the misconception) - every VCR has its own brand of 'Edit' and what it thinks is best for that purpose - but is the most raw, and the purist choice. I just see it as another option to use depending on the tape.

The (sort of) PAL version NV-FS200 that I own doesn't have the same switches, it has 'Noise Filter/OFF/EDIT'. I described it in detail in post #17. But I'm positive EDIT works the same way on your 1980 - it disables the DNR, and disables the picture slider (try it).

And I've just looked up your switches now. From the manual:

Select the operation of the image compensation circuit as the playback image requires. (When a tape has been recorded with the VHS system, the DETAIL setting functions in the same way as NOR.)
DETAIL: Select this position when the image is free from snow-like noise. It is used when playing back a pre-recorded S-VHS tape or other quality recording tapes.
NOR: Normally, this position is selected. The snow-like noise is reduced and the picture appears cleaner.
EDIT: Select this position when editing a tape. The deterioration in the picture quality is minimized

So that explains why Detail and Nor look the same for VHS. Have a test to see if it makes a difference for S-VHS, and a closer look at how much difference EDIT makes. On the FS200, at least, it's an obvious change.

[Quasipal]

I don't get it. How does your post relate to the topic?

FS200 is PAL equivalent of AG-1800 and I was responding to previous posts that nobody was using the specialist record features of these decks - I do however.

[lordsmurf]

There was a more advanced model after the FS-NV200, too! There was no NTSC equiv for that deck. I think it was the HS-NV1000. (Going from memory here.)

JVC offers one of the truest pictures there is, while Panasonic sharpens the hell out of it (consumer or pro). That's why many wrongly think the JVC is "soft" when that not the case. However, some tapes DO react badly to JVC transports/heads, so those tapes can be soft. So this isn't as easy as some pretend. VCRs are not an easy subject, and never have been. It's why you must own both (several actually) and compare each tapes for best output. I don't own multiples VCRs for shits and grins!

[jman98]

Guys - Pixelrage last logged in almost a month ago on April 23 to make post #5. He hasn't been back since. I guess he didn't like being told that he was kind of late to be waking up to the idea of saving his precious video tapes and that trying to save over 200 of them may not be very realistic. If this thread has value to you in what it's currently morphed to, which doesn't really have anything to do with the very specific question originally asked, then that's fine. Or if you just like to hear yourself talk then I guess that's OK too. But if you think you are actually helping Pixelrage, you are not.

[SixFiftyThree]

FS200 is PAL equivalent of AG-1800 and I was responding to previous posts that nobody was using the specialist record features of these decks - I do however.

No offense, but why? It's 2014. You should really just get a new PC for editing.

There was a more advanced model after the FS-NV200, too! There was no NTSC equiv for that deck. I think it was the HS-NV1000. (Going from memory here.)

Yes that's the one - just a small correction, it's the NV-HS1000. But good memory on your part.

I almost landed a nice one a while back. It has a different transport and heads to the NV-FS200, among other things, but much of the same functions and additional ones eg. 'AI' which I think is like JVC's AUTO. It's said to have a better PQ (more natural, less boosted) but mechanically inferior, so I'm told. Not sure I'd necessarily call it more advanced, though I want to. Mostly it's just different I think, for better or worse.

It's interesting to compare the PAL models to NTSC. I almost want to say that the NV-FS200 is not the 1980 but actually the 1970. Or maybe a cross. Check out 1970's panel - it's nearly the same as FS200. It has my Noise Filter in place of Detail/Nor, it's also missing Auto/Wide/Nor and B/W switch just as FS200 is. Also, I have the G2 mech - doesn't 1980 have the K mech? From what I've read, the 1970's PQ is also more familiar - a rawer image, with cruder filtering. That sounds about right.

Has anyone here owned and directly compared the internals of these PAL and NTSC models?

JVC offers one of the truest pictures there is, while Panasonic sharpens the hell out of it (consumer or pro). That's why many wrongly think the JVC is "soft" when that not the case. However, some tapes DO react badly to JVC transports/heads, so those tapes can be soft. So this isn't as easy as some pretend. VCRs are not an easy subject, and never have been. It's why you must own both (several actually) and compare each tapes for best output. I don't own multiples VCRs for shits and grins!

Agree. Some tapes are just not friends with JVC, even if they track well, they just don't look good. The Pana definitely handles 2nd gen ones better for instance. On the other hand, it certainly likes to expose all that VHS goodness too - at times I wish it would act like a JVC instead and just filter some of that crap. Yeah, multiple VCRs are a must if one can afford them.

If this thread has value to you in what it's currently morphed to, which doesn't really have anything to do with the very specific question originally asked, then that's fine. Or if you just like to hear yourself talk then I guess that's OK too. But if you think you are actually helping Pixelrage, you are not.

The very specific question of " would it be worth spending $300 for a restored one?" On the contrary I think the posts have had plenty to do with the question, and others like it. Even if it's a bit off track now, I still think someone other than Pixelrage can find the discussion useful.

[lordsmurf]

Nope, the FS200 was the 1980. The 1970 was the ... FS90? It was a two-digit model. (Hint: Manufacture dates are similar for both series.)

Yes, 1980 is K mech.

A member at www.digitalFAQ.com has them all -- juhok, I think. I'm doing some major work there right now, and we've discussed these in depth around 2010-2011. If/when I come across it, I'll let you know. (Search works too, but sometimes the good convos take a while to find.)

The 1980 and other service manuals are also there (ie, see the K mech info).

[Deter]

vaporeon800, What do you want to know, as stated the TBC breaks the picture in to vertical lines, if you look close enough you can see them. At first I thought it was a problem with the machine DS-840 (I think that was the unit) Than tested out a few more of these decks and saw the same problem. Being old broadcast VCR's, when they made them, they were not being used on LCD screens, more like old school TV's. With my current LCD can see a heck of a lot more detail than when VCR's were really in use. My guess is they didn't know this was a problem cause they couldn't see it.

Back to the $1,000 statement, I can fix any AG-1980 with in reason, many of them need to be re-built, however some units are better than others. In other words if it is going to cost $1,000 than we dump the unit, buy another one, and hope the repair costs are less...The last one I repaired, told the guy it would have been cheaper with a different unit, this one had so many problems that it cost me about $750 to fix, that was on a really bad unit. Sometimes it can cost less than $100. Honestly I've have never seen anything like these AG-1980's, all of them are pretty much bad, to be honest, very few can fix these things, trust me I know.....Again when they were made it was never thought that in 15 years you would have to re-built them....

[SixFiftyThree]

Nope, the FS200 was the 1980. The 1970 was the ... FS90? It was a two-digit model. (Hint: Manufacture dates are similar for both series.)

Interesting, I always thought the NV-FS100 was the model commonly regarded as 1970's counterpart. But I'll take your word for it. Can't say I've looked into it much myself. If a part of you thinks my theory holds some water though, perhaps a 2nd look could be worthwhile.
Thanks for the info too, I'll have a browse over at your forum.

Back to the $1,000 statement, I can fix any AG-1980 with in reason, many of them need to be re-built, however some units are better than others.

Deter, have you ever worked on the PAL equivalents? I'm presuming you could fix them too.

[Deter]

If you are using the PAL equivalents, my guess is you live out side the US, the shipping back and forth is going to be insane. Maybe change the title is it worth paying $300 in shipping costs.

In my opinion the PAL equivalents have a much better picture. The recordings that I have from the PAL Panasonic have less Chroma noise, better quality image, clearer image, sharper picture and overall better color tone.

[manono]

If you are using the PAL equivalents, my guess is you live out side the US, the shipping back and forth is going to be insane. Maybe change the title is it worth paying $300 in shipping costs.

I have a PAL equivalent and am in the US and was wondering the same.

In my opinion the PAL equivalents have a much better picture. The recordings that I have from the PAL Panasonic have less Chroma noise, better quality image, clearer image, sharper picture and overall better color tone.

Based on what I've seen I agree, and it makes me wonder whether or not lordsmurf has ever seen what a good PAL Panasonic can do. It's okay if he hasn't since he's in the US, but he tars them all - NTSC and PAL - with the same brush

[NJRoadfan]

PAL regions got more advanced decks based on Panasonic's "Super Drive" Z-chassis. Japan also got a few TBC enabled NTSC Z-chassis decks too. No idea why they didn't make their way to the US as Panasonic was delivering updated professional models well past the release of the AG-1980 (the AG-DS545/555 come to mind here). The Z-chassis was simplified compared to the K-chassis. Easier to service and less things to break... at least according to Panasonic. All those consumer decks that sanyln liked were Z-chassis units.

The coolest deck was one that could take both full size and SVHS-C tapes. It had a fancy motorized loading slot that switched between the sizes.

[PuzZLeR]

Guys - Pixelrage last logged in almost a month ago on April 23 to make post #5. He hasn't been back since. I guess he didn't like being told that he was kind of late to be waking up to the idea of saving his precious video tapes and that trying to save over 200 of them may not be very realistic. If this thread has value to you in what it's currently morphed to, which doesn't really have anything to do with the very specific question originally asked, then that's fine. Or if you just like to hear yourself talk then I guess that's OK too. But if you think you are actually helping Pixelrage, you are not.

Yes, the O/P has disappeared/died/etc.

I know you don't care about these units, and can relate since I've been turned off by them too.

But a topic like this is still relevant to the thread's title, and hopefully this minimizes the flow of those newbies coming in - today, in 2014 - talking about getting/fixing an AG-1980 after reading info from other threads they've searched from, like, 2005.

I use the Panasonic FS200 for my video editing work (I make short films as part of my hobby). Honestly, without a powerful computer video editing in the digital domain is painful and slow. I have tried, I have sat there waiting 20 minutes for one simple fade to 'render' and still not being happy as I could not add music or narrative or anything really. I gave up trying to make a DVD from a (waste of money) Panasonic HD camcorder - it used some completely different format that was called AVHD I think - even the manual warned it may take a whole day of computer crunching to make one lousy DVD. Of course no audio dub either...

I wish VHS was better quality but its either that or sit there while my computer works overtime and gets hot.

I don't get it. How does your post relate to the topic?

That was in response to a comment I made earlier, about the editing features of these units, repeated below...

As well, these high-end VCRs offer features that are so outdated, not just their filters. For example, who does editing in the analog stage today? Who cares to record with them either?

Which brings me to my next point.

I'm investigating the DETAIL-NOR-EDIT switch. Not clear on any significant differences between "DETAIL" and "NOR", but EDIT suggests that it could indeed be some form of disabling the D/NR.

But it's overly grainy/noisy, and has artifacts.

Yes it should disable the DNR. But what kind of artifacts? Otherwise, grainy/noisy is as expected with EDIT. Oversharpened too. That's what it does - it boosts HF noise as compensation for the losses expected in analog dubbing. It's not the 'true' image (as is the misconception) - every VCR has its own brand of 'Edit' and what it thinks is best for that purpose - but is the most raw, and the purist choice. I just see it as another option to use depending on the tape.

The (sort of) PAL version NV-FS200 that I own doesn't have the same switches, it has 'Noise Filter/OFF/EDIT'. I described it in detail in post #17. But I'm positive EDIT works the same way on your 1980 - it disables the DNR, and disables the picture slider (try it).

Yes, I did read your post #17, but wasn't certain for an NTSC model. And yes, interestingly enough, it does indeed disable the picture/sharpening slider.

The artifacts I was talking about are, yes, an over-sharpening, and an aliasing, not to mention much higher grain and noise levels. The sharpening is obviously artificial, more like an edge enhancer.

I can agree that it was indeed a mechanism put in place to reduce the tape->tape lossiness in editing, which may have helped someone like me sometime around 1997, or somewhere around then... Again, another useless feature for this day and age with software methods available today.

So I'm assuming it's a "yes" to removing D/NR, but maybe also a "no" too since it does not achieve true image integrity. You'd think a disabling of the picture slider in tandem would achieve this, but no.

(I too think the JVC's EDIT mode achieves the "true" picture image better as per LordSmurf's comments on the two. But, then again, there's other filters I'm concerned about with the JVC units.)

Back to the $1,000 statement, I can fix any AG-1980 with in reason, many of them need to be re-built, however some units are better than others. In other words if it is going to cost $1,000 than we dump the unit, buy another one, and hope the repair costs are less...The last one I repaired, told the guy it would have been cheaper with a different unit, this one had so many problems that it cost me about $750 to fix, that was on a really bad unit. Sometimes it can cost less than $100. Honestly I've have never seen anything like these AG-1980's, all of them are pretty much bad, to be honest, very few can fix these things, trust me I know.....Again when they were made it was never thought that in 15 years you would have to re-built them....

I would trust your expertise (unlike most any other entity doing this). Even so, do you believe a good repair job, assuming it's possible, would last long considering the 1980's complicated structure of discrete components under the hood (whether it's new problems, or the same ones resurfacing)?

The reason I say this is is because the AG-1980 is like certain other technologies (ex: air bags,certain audio equipment, etc.) that are a design much better built at the OEM level - from scratch. A rebuild would be a much different science - re-integrating, testing, etc - with such a layout (especially more-so since the OEM process is long gone).

It's not the money, but the major headaches I'm envisioning.

[Deter]

PuzZLeR, the way I look at these AG units, it is like having an old BMW that has a lot of miles. You take it to the shop the head gaskit is blown you repair that, than your ball joints are bad, next the trans goes. Yea a one time fix may not be the answer cause something else can go. On my unit that I use, which is perfect, had to repair it twice, had it now for about 5 years....Sometimes repairing these units are the headache

I still think these are great VCRs you can get a really good picture out of them, however even on the picture not all units are the same. Some units are better than others. I repaired a unit a few years ago, this one had the best picture that I saw on an AG 1980. Than last year did another one that was below normal.

The JVC decks again tend to look the same, the AG units tend to differ. When I was doing a lot of video work was using 4 different AG-1980 units and every one had a slightly different result when playing tapes. (All my machines were fully restored)

One last thing: I had a tape that I sent to Lord Smurf, for months he couldn't get it to even play on any of his VCR's, he had to send it back and refund his service fee, but he took money out for all the hours he spent not getting this tape to work. The tape didn't work for me either. On one of my AG units the tracking was slightly off, it gave me an idea....

What I ended up doing, cause this unit had no color and had a lot of problems was spent 3 months getting this thing fixed. Not only did I get the 6 hour slp tape from 1993 to track which was recorded on a blockbuster rent a vcr. Went through the entire video and fully restored it. Almost frame by frame. It has no bad frames, picture tears or tracking lines; the quality is 100 times better than the source. It even has a remastered soundtrack. At the time was starting to use Neat Video, and found some videos look fake or bad with this NR software. What I did was just sprinkled it with neat video using very low settings to give it a good look.

This tape was so bad even with this amazing tracking AG unit, still had to do many takes of segments over and over. Than would edit the segments in frame by frame. Than finally did the impossible and restored this video.

Please don't think u just put this tape in and it would track perfect, no, u had to manually adjust in a way the VCR was not designed. Than for whatever reason u pressed stop it would get wrecked and even sometimes playing the tape the tracking would go. I am talking about major white lines in the middle of the video.

One of the tricks was to eject the tape, put it back in press play an rewind at the same tape while holding down both tracking buttons, than I would get lines in the video, and if the sound was muffled I knew it was on the right tracking lines. Than would mess around with the white tracking snow in the picture and move it to the bottom or top. Sometimes it didn't work, other times it did.

On most AG units and VCR's with this tape you would get a single white tracking lines in the video, on this special AG unit you got duel tracking lines. Which with work you could remove from the video, that is the only reason why this worked with this tape.

When I first joined this site back in 2007, I didn't know anything about video, let alone what a TBC's was, it was like going to college and learning online, thank goodness for people like Lord Smurf would put up with all my crazy questions. The goal was always the same, to get the best quality out of a something that was not that good to begin with. The AG-1980 unit for me was the biggest advance I saw in picture quality from my Sony VCR that I got at Macy's when I was a kid.

[PuzZLeR]

I too have had to do some creative editing to get some stuff restored. I'm sure we all did at some point. Glad you got it done.

At the time was starting to use Neat Video, and found some videos look fake or bad with this NR software. What I did was just sprinkled it with neat video using very low settings to give it a good look.

Yes indeed. Although Neat Video is fabulous software, I would take great care when using it with strong settings, otherwise your video will look like Jello. Low settings are the norm in my workflow.

But, with the right settings, a VHS capture IMO always benefits with a pass with Neat Video given VHS'es flaws and dirty signal when transferred to Digital-Land. This is more true when dealing with the output from commonplace VCRs - but Neat Video does the job.

I still think these are great VCRs you can get a really good picture out of them, however even on the picture not all units are the same. Some units are better than others. I repaired a unit a few years ago, this one had the best picture that I saw on an AG 1980. Than last year did another one that was below normal...When I was doing a lot of video work was using 4 different AG-1980 units and every one had a slightly different result when playing tapes. (All my machines were fully restored)

What this tells me is that you never really fully restored them, or, more likely, that it was virtually impossible to do so.

The fact that these AG-1980s differ so much in playback quality is because there may very well still be problems with them - do you really think they varied that much in playback when fresh out of the factory? (If so, then we would have a much higher uncertainty with these units, as if it wasn't enough.)

But this is not a knock on your expertise, it's that I do believe that these units can only really be built 100% at the OEM level, or with parts provided from the OEM assembly process (such as board swaps), not with "repairs" with manual micro piece-by-piece replacement within the complicated, and component dependent, circuitry design under the hood.

Given the age/shape of these units today, and the fact that the OEM process is long gone, I think any individual or entity is in for an adventure if they commit to one now.

[Deter]

Varied playback on AG-1980's....

The big question is why?

I don't know...

It seems some tapes can play with less errors on different AG units, some tapes have a much stronger picture on other AG units. My machine that I use does both. It seems on the better units the picture is tight and not sloppy. It is like the machine has just enough tension. If the tension is lose, do you get a sloppy picture? Does this have something with the tension of the tape being played through the VCR heads? Don't know...

Some machines produce a sharper picture, sometimes you can get a cleaner picture.

Now to the color.
Do this tests with reds. Make a sample VHS recording using just reds. Every time you press stop and than play, the red tone will be slightly different, this happens on every AG-1980 machine. The better units are going to differ less than the ones out of whack. Units with bad caps are going to get a faded red. Next with the reds put black bars or just bars in the video and look at the Chroma noise and picture bleeding. Unit to unit this again differs.

Than you have the difference on playback of the SP, LP and SLP tapes. On LP recordings you tend to get two different tracking problem in the picture which create a specific type of noise. Depending on the machine it does vary.